I Have No Good Answer
by darksideofnight
Summary: Spirit wasn't sure how to comfort the crying child. How did you explain to a child that they were weird? How did you explain that the teasing he'd just received was only the tip of the ice burg? He didn't want to be the one to tell Kid that he had no mother.


Golden eyes were wet with unshed tears. He felt a deep sense of being out of place. The feeling was familiar, but this time was not associated with symmetry. He didn't allow his tears to fall, instead standing erect, the only sign that he was hurt being his clenched fists.

"Is your mom a _whore_?" He felt like screaming, doing anything to shut these people up, but he couldn't speak. He stood in an empty hallway in Shibusen, surrounded by three students, all male. "Look at him, he's going to _cry_!" He knew if he fought them, he would not able to resist the urge to try and kill them, too. So, instead of saying anything at all, he simply turned and ran away. Feeling further shamed by his flight, he brushed the tears from his eyes as he heard them laughing behind him. Once outside, he summoned Beezlebub.

It wasn't fair. He didn't even go to his father's school. And still, those older boys made fun of him. He was a seven year old boy, and still those boys said those terrible things to him. He didn't know those answers. For all he knew, what they said was true. He didn't know what a whore was. But it couldn't be something good, by the way they'd been laughing at him. And he didn't want to ask Chichiue, because then he might think _he _was the one saying it. Perhaps Spirit would tell him. Upon thinking this, he remembered that he still hadn't reported to him about his mission. It had been his first one all by himself, after all. It seemed like an important thing to forget. Swallowing a panic attack at his own negligence, he instead turned Beezlebub around and headed back. This time he would not run away.

This time when he passed, the hallway was empty, so he continued on to the hallway of guillotines, finally finding Shinigami-sama and Spirit consulting the large mirror. Lord Death turned to face him, and waved cheerfully, Spirit smiled slightly.

"Hey, Kiddo! I see your mission went well!" Kid smiled, and ran to give his father a hug, he didn't want to bother his father, after all, he had work to do, right? So he just smiled as big as he could, and wrapped short arms around what would have been his father's legs.

"Yeah, I killed the Kishin egg!" His mask didn't change, but Kid knew his father was smiling as he patted him on the head with a gloved hand.

"How are you feeling? You're not hurt?" Concern was evident in his voice, but Kid just released him from the hug.

"Nope! Not even a little bit! But I guess I am sorta tired…" As if on cue, he raised a small hand to his mouth as he yawned.

"Alrighty! Spirit, please take Kid home!" The younger Shinigami would have protested, but he would prefer to have someone to talk to anyway, since he was sad, so he followed without comment, stopping only to wave good bye to his father.

The pair walked in silence for a short while on their way to Gallows mansion. Kid stared at the ground, not wanting to pretend he wasn't a bit upset anymore, his shoulders slumped a bit.

"What's wrong?" Spirit had adopted a blank expression, experience telling him that if he, the adult, seemed upset, it would only serve to upset a young child even more. Kid looked up at him teary cat-like eyes.

"Mr. Spirit, what's a whore?" He was a little shocked by _that._ His precious Maka had never asked him anything so vulgar…where did he hear the word? Spirit desperately hoped it hadn't been _him_ to say it, or Shinigami-sama would have his head for teaching him such words…

"Where did you hear that word?" Kid stopped walking and promptly burst into tears, triggering a bout of panic in the death scythe. "What! What's wrong?_!_" He had bent down to face him, but he continued to cry for a good thirty seconds before finally answering.

"Th-these boys at the school…they s-said that my mom was one!" This time he couldn't hold back his sad expression. How do you tell a kid that_ they_ were the weird one? How would he explain that Kid was going to have to deal with taunts of this sort for the rest of his childhood? He stood up straight, but bent down again and picked the crying boy up in his arms, continuing the trek to the house. He got a few sympathetic looks from people he presumed were other parents, but ignored them. When they finally made it to the house, Kid had stopped crying, instead sniffling quietly and leaning his head on the man's shoulder. He opened the door and walked up to the bedroom he knew belonged to Kid. The dark room was unnervingly symmetrical as always, matching the rest of the house. He sat the boy down on the bed and looked at him.

"Kid, next time someone says that to you, you need to just ignore it." He swallowed; worried he would say the wrong thing. "If it's anything about your mom, I want you to just ignore it, okay?" Kid was too tired to catch the 'next time' part, and only nodded quietly, and stood up, walking to the bathroom to both check his symmetry and brush his teeth. Spirit sighed, waiting for the child to get back in the bed. When he did, he stood up, knowing that the child neither wanted nor required any further attention.

"Good night, Kid. Try and feel better in the morning."

"Good night, Mr. Spirit. I'll try."

Spirit walked back to the Death room slowly, trying to come up with words to tell Lord Death what had been bothering his son.

"What's up, Spirit?" The death scythe sighed heavily before replying.

"Kid was upset on the walk home." Concern was evident even on the white mask.

"About what?"

"Some kids were bullying him when he got here." The concern turned to anger, causing Spirit to feel a twinge of fear, though he knew this wasn't directed at him. He turned away from the blank mirror.

"If he's upset, then I'll go home for today and make sure he's okay." Spirit nodded.

"Alright, I'll handle things here. But, Lord Death, don't _make_ him explain, okay?" It was Shinigami's turn to sigh in defeat.

"You're probably right. You'll have to tell me what happened tomorrow, okay?"

"Sure, I will." He replied, even though he still wasn't certain that he wanted to.

A/N: I feel kind of mean after this one, and also awkward, cause I totally ran all over the topic they don't talk about in the show…I don't know…it's my head canon that kid doesn't have a mom, but is a part of Shinigami which like, broke off…? Whatever, in my head, Kid has no mom. Please review, and if you want, tell me your head canon for Kid's mom! I like hearing new ideas! Also, sorry this had a lot of spirit where there probably should have been Shinigami…but I'm not really sure I can portray that situation very well, so this is what you get!


End file.
